Rants on Cycling and on Life:
Photos of people and bicycles that pass in front of my camera

1.13.2008

the inaugural ride

the inaugural ride...

the inaugural rideno... not the inaugural ride of the yearthe inaugural ride of the franken fixie after the frame repair job by maxthe inaugural ride of the year happened around One AM on New Year's Day as I killed time before registering for the SSWCoh... sure I thought there was going to be a party at this friend's housewell... there was no partythat is a different story

today I took the inaugural ride on the franken fixie after max welded the frame back togetherso I slapped the parts back on the bikethe front wheel selection was randomnot sure what was on there beforeno real reason why I selected that front wheel

I did pull the mustache barsreturning to some standard riser barsthen added a utility rackboth bars and rack scored from maxmax was lightening his load before heading westhe got some moneyI got some parts

the rack went on simply enoughalthough for me it is more fashion than functionthe weight of that rack is without functiona bike that would be the lightest in my quiver may lose that spot due to this lead rackbut I am leaving the rack

so... today while dean was at a soccer themed birthday party and lisa hiked with grant and brutus in rock creek parkI hung in the basement with my bike in the standnot sure how many songs cycled through the iPod before I was donelisa left out for an errand so I hung with grant until she got back

with lisa back I got on the bikewith no real great ambition I took the franken fixie onto a closed stretch of Rock Creek ParkwayI spun the small gear out past the Park Police Station on Beach Drive across the Maryland borderthen turned around at the stop sign at the junction of a road whose name I can not recall

at the turn around I stepped off the bike and checked to see if the bike was still solidI slammed the front wheel to see if it was vibrating loose with this odd rack connectionthere was a jiggle of the cranks armsthere was a tug at the rear wheelI examined the area of the welds for cracking paint

then got back on the bikebefore pointing down the hill I had a staring contest with a young deer... doe or buck I do not know

the ride was shortbut it was not meant to be a work outit was just a getting out of the house and getting on the bikeeverything seemed to be working well enough

feeling good about the build I decided to point it homethe clouds were dark on my departurethe sky was not any more bright after an hour on the bike

cranking up the sidewalk on Porter Street I moved at a steady pacethe gearing is small but I was hammering just the samestill in the saddle I muscled things up the hill at a solid pace

it seems that my build was not as solid as I had thoughtI went from rock solid to that same lost feeling a person gets when they lean back in a chair too faras it turns out the grips that had been spinning a little freely were not on tight enough for this sort of torkI do not know if the grip made the sound of a popping champagne bottlebut I do know that I was venerable and I was scaredcrashing on a mountain bike is part of my second naturebut this crashing on a fixie is totally new to me

with my left hand still holding the grip my body fell to the rightmy feet still fastened to the SPDsand the rear wheel and pedals still rotating in unicensefalling into the tall chain link fence was clearly a better option than falling in the path of traffica second of disorientation then back to moving up the hill

in the scheme of things it was not a bad crashinstead of going off the curb and getting flattened by a speeding metro bus I slammed into the wire fenceit was not as bad as it could have beenthe fence caught me like a netonly not so gentlyit was a slightly painful crash

the level of my injury did not seem seriouspainful... yes... meriting a visit to the hospital... noI rode for another ten minutes to confirm I was alrightwhen I did roll up to my house I did feel a bit sore

my wrist and thumb are soreso is my elbowthat is all on the side where the grip popped freewhile my shoulder on the other side is a tad sore... that is the side that crashed into the fence

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